CROWDING MEMORIES.
MRS. TILOSIAS BAILEY ALDRICH, the widow of the well-known American poet who once edited the Atlantic Monthly, has written a pleasant volume of reminiscences entitled Crowding Memories. (Constable. 18s. net.) In the early chapters sho recalls her acquaintance with Edwin Booth, the famous Shake- spearean actor, at whose rooms in 1862 she first met her future husband. Edwin Booth was a romantic genius, whose career was marred for a time by the mad crime of his brother, John Wilkes Booth, who murdered Lincoln. Mrs. Aldrich describes the misery of the unhappy family while they were waiting for news of the assassin after his flight, the old mother praying that he might commit suicide rather than be hung. Mrs. Aldrich was married in 1865 and saw much of the literary world of America and of England. She gives a whimsical account of Mrs. Beecher Stowe, who went to visit her in her country-house and was overcome by the heat and a too potent cup so that she fell fast asleep on Mrs. Aldrich's sofa. When Mrs. Aldrich came to London she met Browning and was, it seems, painfully disillusioned, because he looked a man of the world and "nothing in his appearance, except the white hair, proclaimed the poet." " More disquieting even than the diamond studs was a crush hat, which Mr. Browning carried under his arm and sat upon through the dinner." Henry Irving, we gather, played his pad better and won Mrs. Aldrich's approval.
Previous page
